The ultimate balance suggestions thread

With all the balance thread popping up in the last few months, I felt I needed to contribute as well, and here are my proposed changes for future patches:

Global balance:

  • the militia line is seen very rarely apart from m@a + archers or drushes, therefore I suggest they get a buff in form of +2 attack and remove the gold cost of supplies

  • archers have been way too meta for the past months, even with the pathfinding fixes, I suggest a nerf with a -1 range and a +10 increase in wood cost

  • same goes for knights, increase their cost by +10 gold to negate the steamrolling from castle age onward

  • camels die too easily to anything that is not a knight, and basic micro from any kind of CA makes them useless to use against tho, they should have a increased +1 pierce armor and +1 with the heavy camel upgrade

  • fire ships are too strong on water, and players never make demo ships as they are essentially wasting resources, especially when the fire ship player micros the fire ships away, so I suggest a
    reduction in cost of the demo ship of -15 gold to encourage making them (and reduce the amount of resources lost when fighting fire ships)

  • Castle drop are very strong, especially with franks and teutons. The building time of castles should be increased by at least +50%, if not more, to allow the victim to respond and clear out enemy military around the dropped castle.

  • sheep scouting is too unrealistic and shouldn’t be possible, therefore I suggest sheep have only one tile view range.

Civ balance changes:

Aztecs:

  • Jaguar warriors are seldom seen during games, therefore I suggest aztecs have no more access to the champion line, Jaguar gold cost is reduced by -10 gold and can be trained at barracks.

  • Atlatl should increase the range of skirms by +2 instead of +1

Berbers:

  • the UT for camel regeneration is too weak for its cost, especially compared to berserkergang
    I suggest the regeneration effect is increased by +50%

  • increase the ship movement speed from +10% to +25% and shipwright free

Britons:

  • The range of archers is too high, and they are almost a winning pick on arena and black forest: remove the range bonus (only keep yeomen), but thumb ring should be available.

  • Warwolf should increase the area of effect by 50%, it is underwhelming at the moment

Bulgarians:

  • Kreposts have nearly the same DPS as castles, at half the cost, therefore making them way too strong in a castle drop strategy, even stronger than the franks on arena
    Suggestion: either increase their cost to 450 stone, or reduce the damage to 5 pierce (from 9)

  • the konnik in dismounted form shouldn’t have its armor upgrade removed (and switched to inf upgrades)….it doesn’t seem logical that he loses all his armor while falling of his horse.

  • to further increase the viability of bulgarian champs, the bagains upgrade should also increase pierce armor by +2 (+5/+2), but gold cost increased by 200g

Burmese:

  • burmese have access to one of the strongest cavalry archer- style unit in the game, the arambi
    I feel that this unit is balanced, but they shouldn’t have access to CA and heavy CA, but have parthian tactics affect the arambi

  • remove padded archer armor

  • Hohdaw doesn’t feel like a significant improvement on the battle elephant’s strength: it should be +2/+2 (instead of +1/+1)

Byzantines:

  • one of the most underwhelming civ in the lineup, they should be seriously buffed

  • increase the discount on trash and camels to -33% (instead of -25%)

  • Logistica should also affect the stable units, to increase the viability of cavalry against the militia line

  • remove greek fire and replace it with a tech that would increase the healing range of monks, to put a better emphasis on their team bonus

Celts:

  • reduce lumberjack bonus to +10%

  • reduce infantry movement speed to +10%

  • remove the sheep stealing mechanic

  • siege weapons should fire only 10% faster

  • increase woad raider cost to 75f 35g

  • remove siege ram

  • stronghold should only increase firing speed by 10%

  • remove the knight line entirely, and remove hussar: the celts weren’t known for their knights or cavalry

Chinese:

  • Add bombard cannon, bombard tower and hand cannoneer: the chinese invented gunpowder and still don’t have access to gunpowder units !

  • as such rocketry should increase bombard cannon damage by +20 and hand cannonneer damage by +4

  • the food deficit at the start makes the chinese dark age very awkward, especially for new players.
    Food should be -100 instead of -200

  • the team farm bonus is barely noticeable, and I suggest it is increased to +75

Cumans:

  • the steppe lancer is still too much op
    I suggest : -15 HP, gold cost increased by +5g, ROF increased from 2.3 to 2.5, damage decreased from 9 to 7, the elite steppe lancer upgrade should cost 1200f and 750g (from 900f/550g)

  • steppe husbandry should only affect stable units, not cavalry archers

  • the palisade wall bonus is too strong, especially in team games with a byzantine ally, it should be reduced to +15%

  • kipchaks should have a 5 frame delay, the unit as it stands is op. Accuracy should also be reduced to 60%

  • cumans should only be allowed to build the siege workshop in feudal, but not create rams, as nothing in feudal can counter them. As such they would still benefit from having a very early sw once they hit castle.

Ethiopians:

  • add the free halb upgrade

  • archers bonus reduced to only +5% faster fire, to combat the archer meta

  • shotel warrior gold cost reduced to 5g per unit, HP reduced by -30, to increase their use as an emergency glass cannon

  • petard should be affected by torsion engines

Franks:

  • add bloodlines, remove light cavalry upgrade

  • remove the archery range and archer related blacksmith upgrades

  • bearded axe should increase range by +3 (instead of +1), throwing axemen are buff and it should be reflected in-game

Goths:

  • the team bonus is redundant with perfusion: replace it with the ability for allies to create huskarls in barracks once the goth player has researched anarchy

  • remove siege workshop, archery range, monastery, stable, dock and all related technologies.

  • new civ bonus: barracks cost -75% wood

  • +10 population should be available from feudal age onwards

  • make arson available

Huns:

  • remove atheism

  • huns cannot move further than the castle age, to reflect on their history

  • to compensate, they should be able to recruit trebuchets in castle age

  • marauders allows tarkans to be created from any hun production building

Incas:

  • start with TWO free llamas

  • remove loom, after all incan vils are affected by blacksmith upgrades

  • towers are disabled

  • the effect of andean sling should only affect the slinger

Indians:

  • gain access to a new unique unit, the oliphaunt: can be created in the stable in imperial age
    1200HP
    15 attack
    5/3
    9 range with 5 arrows
    same speed as the other elephant units
    doesn’t have the cavalry archer armor class
    cost: 100f/70g

  • remove the elephant archer from the castle

  • increase fishermen range to be able to fish deep sea fish from the shoreline

  • remove access to the spearline

Italians:

  • silk road should allow the trade carts and cogs to trade between player markets and docks, as the ut is useless in 1v1

  • pavise should only affect the genoese crossbowman, as it is the only unit with an actual pavise on its model

  • increase pavise pierce armor from +1/+1 to +1/+6, because shields block arrows really well

  • make paladin available to increase the viability of italians vs other cavalry civs

Japanese:

  • no change needed, the japanese are perfectly balanced and average

Khmer:

  • remove mill and mill related technologies

  • villagers should also be able to garrison in production building and in stone walls (since the khmer vils have figured out how to open doors, they should also be able to figure out how to climb on top of walls)

  • battle elephants move +40% faster

  • ballista elephants should only be able to be created if you garrison a scorpion and a battle elephant in a castle

Koreans:

  • UT for onager should give +2 onager range (instead of +1)

  • team bonus should give +1 onager range in addition to the reduction of minimum range

  • wood discount also applies to onagers

  • free husbandry

Lithuanians:

  • remove knight- line, as it is redundant with the leitis

  • change hill fort effect to being able to create leitis in stables, similar to marauders and anarchy
    also, leitis -10 gold

  • remove squires

  • remove elite skirmisher

  • remove crossbowman

  • remove fervor

Magyars:

  • remove arbalester, as to make CA a much more enticing choice of unit

  • remove wings from the huszar model, magyars aren’t polish or even slavs and it should be reflected in game

  • villagers also kill boar with one strike

  • change team bonus from foot archers to CA +2 los

Malay:

  • reduce cost of karambit warrior by -25f and -15g to increase their usability

  • battle elephants 66% cheaper

  • fish traps free

  • researching forced levy should turn half of the player villagers into militia as a bonus and to further fit the theme; it would also provide a power spike for the malay player to exploit

Malians:

  • rename the civ description to “everything civilization”

Mayans:

  • resources last 50% longer, but vil carry capacity reduced by -5, to balance out the mayan early economy

  • obsidian arrows also affect plumed archers

  • to balance out the extra damage dealt to building, I suggest bracer to be disabled

  • not much else really, this civ is pretty good with only those minor changes to be done

Mongols:

the mangudai needs to be totally reworked:

  • remove frame delay from elite mangudai, increase to 10 for non-elite mangudai

  • ROF from 1.7 to 1.62

  • 95% accuracy to 100%

  • change speed from 1.45 to 1.43 to balance out the slight buffs

  • TT 21 seconds

  • remove attack bonus vs spearmen

  • mangudai aren’t affected by parthian tactics, thumb ring, bloodlines or heresy

  • hunters work 50% faster instead of 40%

  • enable elite cannon galleon

Persians:

  • enable heresy

Portuguese:

  • with the lowest pick rate of all civilizations, portuguese should just be removed from the game

Saracens:

  • zealotry should also give +2 range to camel units, to give saracen camels a more unique feel

  • madrasah also affects mamelukes, to compensate for their high gold cost

  • Skirmishers and CA also benefit the damage against building civ and team bonus

Slavs:

  • boyars deal +15 damage against the knight line

  • boyar damage reduced from 12 to 4

  • when it dies, the boyar stands back up as a teutonic knight (similar to the konnik mechanic)

  • farm bonus reduced from 10% to 7%

Spanish:

  • add back in the “HEEYYYHEEEYAHAAAHEEEYYY” in the spanish theme

  • enable parthian tactics to make CA viable for spanish

  • disable monk to encourage the usage of missionary

Tatars:

  • Units deal 25% damage and receive 25% less damage when fighting from higher elevation

  • timurid siegecraft effect reduced to +1 range on trebuchets

  • remove siege engineers

  • in addition to dealing extra damage to elephants, flaming camels have a chance to turn elephants to gaia as a wild animal, to simulate elephants going on a rampage.

  • team bonus should apply to foot archers instead of cavalry archers

Teutons:

  • increase teutonic knight speed by 0.1, to make it seems less like a heavy armored slug

  • increase the barracks and stable units bonus from +2 total to +3 total, with +1 starting in feudal age, to compensate for the lack of husbandry and maybe make the teuton paladin viable (could be increased even further)

  • coinage and banking are free

  • remove the 2x healing range of monk, replace with +2 melee armor

Turks:

  • replace janissary with photonman to at least give turks a fighting chance in 1v1

  • artillery affects trebs, mangonels and scorpions, as they are also artillery pieces

Vikings:

  • disable militia line to put an emphasis on berserkers

  • remove fire ships, galley line and canon galleons as vikings only used longboats during the medieval era

  • berserkers now generate gold when they damage buildings, similarly to the keshik

TLDR: 2000 words and 9 pages of amazing ideas I hope you agree with

3 Likes

After this thread is closed could you post suggestions to rebalance Minesweeper ?

8 Likes

what the f.ck 11111 this is even worse than the mangudai buff thread 111111

do u even play this game?

5 Likes

Lmao Nice b8 m8…

4 Likes

I don’t know what is more meme. This intentional memey post or people taking it seriously :smiley:

Man, you took a lot of time to make this prank

Spirit of the law, is that you?

1 Like

WTF is this?? Reddit? AoEZone?

I am not quite sure what you are trying to achieve.
For example: you want to heavily nerf Celts even though they are well balanced civ on all skill levels… Why?

This thread is a troll, isnt it?

6 Likes